


Murders & Meet-Cute

by fwooshy



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Auror Harry Potter, Auror Ron Weasley, Crack, Excessively Terrible Interior Decorating, F/M, Humor, Infidelity (of minor relationships), M/M, Minor Character Death, Ron Weasley is an Easy Laugher (and Pansy likes it), Sugar Baby Draco Malfoy, Writer Pansy Parkinson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:14:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26832754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fwooshy/pseuds/fwooshy
Summary: Draco and Pansy find Draco's sugar daddy murdered in his own (garishly ornate, canopied) bed. Aurors Harry and Ron are sent to investigate.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy & Pansy Parkinson, Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Pansy Parkinson/Ron Weasley
Comments: 10
Kudos: 111





	Murders & Meet-Cute

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [THE DAY-DRINKING, SUGAR-BABY DETECTIVE AGENCY](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14707341) by [relenafanel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/relenafanel/pseuds/relenafanel). 



> This was heavily inspired by [relenafanel](https://www.archiveofourown.org/users/relenafanel/pseuds/relenafanel)'s stucky/thorki fic [THE DAY-DRINKING, SUGAR-BABY DETECTIVE AGENCY](https://www.archiveofourown.org/works/14707341). I hope it's okay that I remixed it! It's just, so good, really, thank you!

Pansy picked up her mobile on the second ring. 

“Why aren’t you answering your Floo?” Draco demanded from the other end of the line.

Pansy’s finger hovered longingly over the “End Call” button before she sighed, long and suffering, and put Draco on speakerphone. “I’m in my bedroom, darling. I’m painting my nails. I haven’t got a Floo in here.”

“You really ought to look into —”

“What’ve you got against a mobile anyway?”

Draco gasped, high pitched and offended. “What do I’ve got? I had to wait fifteen minutes for this decrepit Muggle device to charge before I could even turn it on to call you, and that was on top of the twelve minutes I spent looking for the right cable to plug the damn thing in, I don’t get why they necessitate five types of cables that all do the same thing —”

“Alright, alright,” Pansy sighed, pressing a palm to her forehead. It was strangely wet, and sticky. She jerked forward and cursed, flexing her fingers to take a closer look at her now-ruined nails. She tapped the mobile’s front-facing camera on and angled it toward her forehead.

“What’s going on over there?” Draco asked, before starting up again, “See now if we’d been on the Floo, I wouldn’t need to ask, I would just see —” 

“Can you please shut your trap for a sec, hun?” Pansy snapped, “I’ve just messed up my nails, no thanks to you. Now I’ve bright red streaks of lacquer all across my forehead.”

Draco dissolved into peals of laughter. “Now - now I’ve - I’ve really got to see, Pans, please —”

Pansy tilted her head to the left and snapped a photo. She texted it to Draco.

More laughter from the other end. “You - you look like that baby lion cub in that animated movie we watched last weekend. SIMBAAAA,” Draco yelped, before lapsing into another fit of giggles.

“And you’re no better than a hyena,” Pansy quipped back. She picked up her wand and pointed it to her forehead to cast a quick Scourify. She shuddered; it burned. She’d always been pants at household spells. “Why’d you call anyway?”

“Just wanted to chat,” he said. Pansy heard the clink of ice dropping into a glass. She checked the time: it was two in the afternoon. She Scourify-ed her ruined nails and then put the whole set neatly away on her desk.

Draco still hadn’t spoken. But Pansy knew to wait. Finally he said, “I think he’s cheating on me.”

Pansy rolled her eyes. “He’s already cheating on his wife with you. What’s the big deal?”

“I mean, it’s rather insulting to me, isn’t it? Being cheated on by a fifty-year-old man?”

Pansy made a face. “Don’t tell me you love him.”

“Ew, no! How can you even joke about —”

“Then let the old man have his harem of twinks and _leave it be_.”

Draco paused. Pansy could just feel him trying to rationalize his plan for reckless retaliation. “I just don’t like secrets,” Draco eventually said.

Pansy thought that was the dumbest lie he’d ever told. But she told him he’d help him rummage through his flat anyway.

***

The Greengrasses normally resided in a manor not far from the Malfoys in Wiltshire, but Lord Greengrass had a weak stomach for travel and so kept a penthouse in London as well.

Pansy phoned Draco when she got in front of the complex. It was a bright, sunny day. She almost wished she wore something less dark; she was starting to sweat.

“Pansy, you better leave,” Draco’s voice finally came through after the sixth ring. He sounded out of breath.

“Why? What’s wrong?”

“He’s — he’s —,” he gasped, choking.

“I’m coming up, open the door,” Pansy demanded.

“I don’t want you to be complicit—”

“You’re not dealing with this alone!” Pansy shouted. She rattled the door knob until it clicked open. Then she took the Floo to the top floor.

Draco was red-eyed and white-faced and waiting for her at the door. “I — I don’t know what happened —”

“Show me,” Pansy said. And then she made the mistake of looking around. “Merlin, the wallpaper is atrocious here.” She followed the naked prancing men up to the ceiling, where chubby cherub babes lolled idyllically amongst clouds, their eyes an unnaturally piercing yellow. “How’d you even get it up in here?”

Draco paused his hand-wringing to roll his eyes at her. “Blindfolds. And a lot of doggy-style.”

He led her down the garishly gold hall to a white door at the end, a tacky G embellished where a knocker would be. The handle was carved in a shape of a golden swan with satanic ruby eyes. Pansy opened her mouth to comment about it, because honestly, it begged to be lambasted, but Draco already had his fingers encircled around its neck and a second later the door was pushed open and Lord Greengrass laid before them under a canopied bed with his entrails exposed.

Pansy screamed.

***

They reconvened in the kitchen to escape the smell of rot. 

“I’m not going to help you get rid of the body,” Pansy said, leaning back against the stove.

“Pansy, please.”

“You’ve done nothing wrong, why would you try to cover it up?”

Draco crossed his arms across his chest and looked down at the lower cabinetry. They were a deep plum and would have been rather tasteful if not painted over with young lads dancing nude amongst fauns, their genitals jutting out soft but proud. “You know why,” Draco said, dragging Pansy temporarily out of Renaissance hell.

“The DMLE is different now, with Ha -, with, with Pot -, with _him_ ,” she winced, stumbling over Harry Potter’s name despite herself, “in charge. They won’t throw you into Azkaban without a proper trial, and they won’t drag your trial out either. Honestly all they’ve got to do is dose you with Veritasium and you’ll be out in an hour.”

Draco was looking at the tile now. They were a light pink marble, and Pansy thought them rather soothing amidst all the cabinetry chaos. And then she saw the cherubs.

She tore her eyes away and landed back on Draco. “You’re not telling me something,” she accused.

He snapped his gaze back up to her, guilty. His bottom lip trembled.

“Draco,” Pansy said, slowly putting the pieces together, “Who was he cheating on you with?”

Draco opened his mouth. He closed it, swallowing, before saying, “Blaise,” his voice still hoarse.

Pansy stepped back in shock. Blaise had been married to Hannah Abott for the last seven years. They lived in the country. They had three kids. So Pansy was surprised; but then again, it had been an even bigger shock when Blaise had announced that he was marrying a Hufflepuff. “You don’t think he did it?”

Draco shook his head. “I —” he bit his lip. “I was with him last night.”

“What, confronting him?”

“No.” Draco wet his lip again. “We — we were fucking too.”

Pansy’s eyes immediately narrowed. Her two best friends, going behind her back, nevermind this whole _sugar daddy_ business to start — but she bit her tongue. Instead, she said in her most carefully level tone, “Well, we ought to pay him a visit, shouldn’t we?”

***

Blaise was dead too.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been here,” Pansy said, looking around at the white walls of Blaise’s painfully modern London flat. Blaise was draped over a black and white sectional in the middle of an expansive living room, his head hanging off the edge where a more sensible sofa would have had an armrest to prop him up.

She scrunched her nose at a Calder mobile hanging from the ceiling.

“He got it a few years back,” Draco said.

“How’d he explain that to Hannah?”

Draco shrugged. “Like they always do. He had so much business to do at Gringotts, and he was so sick of the travel—”

“Nothing good ever comes out of a London flat,” Pansy snorted. And then she keeled over and sobbed.

They Floo’d back to Lord Greengrass’s flat. Blaise wasn’t helping them think straight.

***

“I really think you ought to Floo the Aurors and just come clean with it all,” Pansy said, her hands tightly clasped in Draco’s. They were crouched on the kitchen floor. Dark shadows casted across Draco’s face; the sun was starting to set.

“You’ve got no one else to protect now,” Pansy continued when Draco said nothing, “Blaise is - well, you can’t protect Blaise anymore anyway, so you might as well save yourself.”

Draco shook his head. “Astoria, though. And Daphne. I couldn’t do it to them. And Hannah, oh god, Hannah— ”

Pansy squeezed his hand until it hurt and he looked up at her in shock. Her mouth thinned to a mean little line. “You knew you were going to hurt them from the start, Draco.”

“I was going to stop after I married Astoria. I mean — I wouldn’t have continued to fuck their dad after — I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t have—”

“Bullshit,” Pansy hissed. Draco’s self-destructive hatred toward his parents knew no bounds. They both knew that.

Draco exhaled then, a slow, trembling breath. He pulled his knees in closer to his chest. “Alright. Okay. Let’s Floo them.”

***

“Merlin,” Harry Potter said when Pansy opened the door. She stepped aside and watched him walk past without a further word, down the hall to where Draco was waiting in front of the bedroom door.

Pansy turned back to the door, where Ron Weasley now stood, patiently waiting to be let in.

“Merlin’s saggy ballsacks,” Ron said when he saw who she was.

“For Circe’s sake, does anyone else work at the Aurors?” Pansy snarked, but unfortunate as it was to admit, she knew that Draco would have the best chance in the care of these two morally upright assholes. So she led him into the kitchen and gave him a cup of tea.

“How long has it been, Weasley?” Pansy asked, “Ten years since I last saw you at Draco’s trial?”

Ron winced. “Sure. How’ve things been with you?”

“Oh you know,” she shrugged.

Pansy was a fairly successful fantasy author. She’d made the New York Times Best Sellers list for the last six years and running. Reviews found her “exceedingly imaginative”, but since all her readers were Muggles, nobody realized that all she did was write about the wizarding world as she knew it; she just renamed Floo to Phloo to get around the Statute of Secrecy limitations. In any case all of that held no weight in this kitchen. So she let Ron Weasley think that she did nothing all day.

Ron lifted the gold-rimmed bone china cup to his lips. He took a sip and immediately sputtered it out. “Is this a bloody joke?” he stammered, shoving the cup under Pansy’s nose for her to see.

She looked down. A nubile lad winked and fluffed his auburn curls. She bursted out laughing. “Lord Greengrass, he—” she gasped, wheezing in laughter, “he certainly had —” another snort, “interesting taste, didn’t he? Nearly comical in his appreciation for —” she bent over, shaking in giggles, “for the young male form.”

When she looked up, Ron was doubled over too. “These - these dials,” he said, poking the stove dials, “Are they - phallic? Is it just me? Please tell me it isn’t just me.”

Pansy squinted. Sure enough, little penises were carved down the center of the dial, their mushroom tips all proudly pointed up. She burst out in another fit of laughter. “How did Draco _live here?_ How did he —”

“Are you talking about me?” Draco asked from the kitchen door frame. He held his nose high but his cheeks were tinged pink.

Harry stood behind him a few steps back, a small frown etched permanently across his mouth. “Ron, I’m going to get the body into the lab, can you—” he motioned toward Draco.

Ron straightened up and nodded. He turned to Pansy and Draco, his quill out, his eyes all hard and serious. “Is it alright if I ask you a few questions?”

“Like we have a choice,” Draco muttered.

“Right,” Ron said. “What’s your relation to Lord Greengrass?”

“Future father-in-law,” Draco answered.

Ron raised an eyebrow. Or rather, both brows, because he wasn’t dexterous enough to raise just one.

“Also my sugar daddy,” Draco mumbled, looking down at the tile again.

Pansy quickly butted in. “Draco lived here most days. He’s been living here for the last two years or so.”

“So you were with him last night and this morning?” Ron continued his questioning. His Spell-Checking Quill stopped with Draco’s silence. Ron frowned, leaning forward slightly.

“Not exactly,” Draco started, “Well, last night I was at Blaise’s.”

Ron nodded. “Alright, can he provide you with an alibi?”

“Well…” Draco started, hesitating. Pansy grabbed his hand. “Well, he’s dead too,” Draco said, looking up at Ron.

The quill dropped to the floor.

***

“I’m going to be honest, things don’t look good for him,” Ron said to Pansy. They were at Blaise’s flat now. A man in the blue robes of St. Mungo’s was wrapping Blaise’s body up in translucent white tarp. Watching him made Pansy want to sick up.

“He didn’t do it,” Pansy said. Her eyes caught a flash of Draco’s white-blonde hair in the mirror down the hall. He was waving his arms around furiously. He took a step back, falling squarely into the view of the mirror so that Pansy could see the full length of his body. Harry stepped forward into the frame, one hand clasped tightly on Draco’s shoulder, his mouth tense and angry.

“I know he didn’t do it,” Ron said softly, as though it was obvious. But Pansy was shocked enough to snap her gaze back at him. She crossed her arms.

He continued, “Yeah, I mean, if he couldn’t even off Dumbledore to save his mother, I don’t see why he’d off his — boyfriends — for, I don’t know, something so petty as jealousy? You said they were cheating on Malfoy with each other?”

“And their wives,” Pansy muttered. She didn’t understand her boys when it came to sex. They wielded it as though it gave them some sort of power. And now look at where it got them. Pansy was over power; all she needed these days was the simple, happy pleasure she got from a vibrator.

“Merlin,” Ron said, running a hand through his ginger hair. Pansy surveyed him closely for the first time that day. He’d filled out rather nicely, his jaw strong and square, his shoulders broad. He looked like he could pick her up and toss her around and then have a nice laugh about it with her after, maybe in the sun, with some drinks.

“You tell me,” Pansy shrugged, “You’re the one with the wife. What would make you cheat? And if you did, would you choose to decorate your London flat with a buffet of phallic imagery?”

Ron barked out a laugh. “What makes you think I have a wife? Merlin, do I look like I’m that settled? I did try to match my tie this morning.”

“No reason,” she said quickly, but she smirked all the same, pleased despite the situation.

***

Draco moved in with Pansy that evening because both of his boyfriends’ flats were now crime scenes and subsequently all his clothes were now crime scene evidence.

Pansy gave him an oversized green jumper that a one night stand had left a few years ago, and her Hogwarts booty shorts that read Slytherin across the ass cheeks. And then she demanded an explanation.

“I’m going to be honest—” he started, to which Pansy muttered, “You better always be honest with me, bitch,” before he continued, “I’m not really sure what happened either. I was fucking Lord Greengrass, sure. He’s dad-hot and he’s got like, a kink list a mile long so even though he was boring at least it was always kind of new. And he was pretty good with gifts. Honestly, me murdering him makes no sense at all, it’s not like I was in his will or anything, I’d really only benefit if I kept him alive and interested—”

“Well, you could’ve been jealous, or something,” Pansy said, thinking back at what Ron had insinuated and subsequently dismissed.

Draco scoffed. “Like I said, I wasn’t really hung up on either of them—”

“Sure, go on then,” Pansy acquiesced. Pansy had never really seen Draco get attached or obsessed over anyone. Except Harry Potter, maybe. But that had been at Hogwarts, forever ago.

“I’m. I’m not sure about Blaise. I mean. He was always so much of an enigma.” He worried his lower lip. “You know… we all thought he was joking about marrying Hannah, but not only did he marry her, he had three kids with her. He’d go to their Quidditch matches and then go off and fuck some random guy that same night.”

“Maybe he just really wanted kids.”

Draco buried his head in his hands. He took a deep, snotty sigh and pulled his fingers through his hair, lifting his head back up again to look at Pansy, glassy-eyed. “Do you really think so? His flat had no sign of them at all. Even Lord Greengrass kept portraits of his daughters in the closet. But his flat was just. Devoid of everything. Do you ever wonder if that’s how he felt inside? Just - empty? Do you think he even cared about us?”

Pansy reached out and pulled Draco up against her chest. “Oh honey, his flat was simply devoid of good design. You’re reading too much into it.”

“I saw him last night because he Floo’d and — it wasn’t — I hadn’t planned on fucking him. We’d never fucked before. I thought, you know, that was crossing the line with him. With friends. But he told me he was fucking Greengrass too, and then to make it up to me we drank, I don’t know, maybe five carafes of honey butterfly mead — that good stuff that Hannah’s family brews — and then, I guess — it just happened, I don’t know. And now he’s dead, and —”

“Darling,” Pansy cooed in his ear, “Darling, it’s alright. I promise I’ll never have sex with you ever. How does that sound?”

Draco snorted. He pulled away from Pansy and wiped his eyes. “Except for that one try in fifth year, I suppose.”

Pansy giggled. “Yeah, I suppose I’ve been traumatized since.” But she reached out and threaded her hand in Draco’s anyway. “What did Potter say to you?”

Draco looked as though he’d eaten a lemon. “Nothing really. He wanted to post Aurors around me all the time. As though I’d try to _escape_ or something, seriously, what’s he thinking? They’ve already got location charms on my wand that aren’t due to expire for another five years, they’ve nothing to worry about.”

“Draco,” Pansy said slowly, fear rising through her suddenly. “Draco, darling, no, he’s _worried_ about you. Have you thought about how the same people who murdered Blaise might be after you too?”

Draco’s eyes widened. “Well, I suppose.”

“Don’t tell me you refused—”

Draco glared. “As if that brute would let me refuse. They’ve got three stationed around your flat as we speak.”

Pansy shot up and peeked out her curtain. Sure enough, two Aurors sat on the front steps of her apartment in their crimson robes.

She lowered herself back down on the sofa. “Oh Merlin,” she muttered, the full force of the day finally coming upon her, “What have we gotten into this time, Draco?”

“No more talk of Aurors,” Draco said. He held out his wine glass. “The rest of the night — to Blaise!”

“To Blaise,” Pansy agreed, bringing up her own wine glass, “And his poor choices in men and in decor.” And then she laughed until she cried.

***

Draco was already up when Pansy woke the next morning. He slammed a cup of coffee and a stack of toast in front of her and waited for her to take two sips before he started in on his plan. Because, of course, he had a plan.

“Can’t you just leave the investigating to the Aurors?” Pansy asked, yawning. She was trying to butter her toast. Draco gently pried the fork out of her hand and replaced it with a knife.

“As if I’d trust those incompetent fools with anything,” Draco scoffed.

Pansy actually would have trusted those incompetent fools with her life. Harry’s team of Aurors had maintained a stellar track record over the last half decade, a record that was carefully monitored and publicized by Hermione Granger’s watchdog group. But she knew better than to say anything when Draco’s got it in him to have a plan. Which is why she really only had herself to blame when the Aurors caught them breaking into Lord Greengrass’s flat later that afternoon.

***

Ron took Pansy down the corner from the Auror offices to a twenty-four hour diner to wait while Draco was being officially questioned. The diner had pink-and-teal striped booths and fun neon lights. Pansy looked down at her all-black ensemble and rebelliously ordered a black coffee while Ron shook his head and ordered a neapolitan milkshake.

“So,” Ron said, leaning back and draping one long arm along the back of the booth, “What’re you two up to?”

Pansy choked on her coffee.

“Sorry, sorry, I’m joking, this isn’t a questioning,” Ron said, leaning forward now with his hands clasped on the table, “It’s just, when Draco’s involved Harry’s always going around saying” — he put on a shrill voice entirely unlike Harry’s deep tenor — “he must be up to something, he’s got to be up to something, he’s — you get the idea. He picked it up in sixth year and hasn’t dropped it since.”

“Merlin that sounds annoying,” Pansy sympathized. She hadn’t realized Harry could be that obsessive. “For what it’s worth, Draco _is_ often up to something.”

“Yeah?” Ron asked, raising both brows.

“Well, yeah,” Pansy said. She took a sip of her coffee and grimaced a bit at the taste. “I mean. I — I think that’s how he grieves, you know. By scheming. Having a plan. He loved him, you know.”

“Greengrass?”

“Oh Merlin, no,” she wrinkled her nose, “No, I mean Blaise.”

“So they were lovers.”

“No — no, just,” her voice hitched, “Just friends.”

“Who fucked.”

“Only — only once.” She dragged her nails against the table. She looked up at the clock. Quarter past four. Draco’s been at the Ministry for twenty minutes now.

“Well, I won’t say I get it,” Ron said, leaning back against the booth again. “This whole casual thing never seems that casual to me. Seems just like a whole lot of complicated. Gimme one girl at a time and I’ll show you casual and fun.”

Pansy grinned. “I hear you there.” She splayed out her fingers across the table, relaxed. “I don’t think Draco does it to be happy, though.”

“Why’s that?”

Pansy shrugged. She dragged a hand through her hair. “I don’t want to read too much into it. But I think he still feels guilty, you know, about - about our sixth, seventh year.”

Ron nodded tersely. “Harry’s definitely like that too. Like he thinks he doesn’t deserve to be happy.” He laughed. “Just watching him makes me feel guilty for being happy.”

“Merlin, me too!” Pansy said, smiling earnestly.

“I wanted to apologize for Harry earlier,” Ron said, sobering up again, “He - he’s not usually like that. I think seeing Malfoy kind of - shook him.”

“Well, I’m sure those Slytherin booty shorts would have shook anyone,” Pansy smirked, recalling the scene. Harry had arrived first, like he always did. He took one look at them rifling through Lord Greengrass’s file cabinets and exclaimed, “What in Merlin are you wearing, Draco?” before dragging Draco by the shoulder out the door. 

“I was kind of shook too,” Ron said, chuckling. And then his bright blue eyes focused in on Pansy. “Where’d he get that jumper from, though?”

Pansy’s throat choked. A one night stand several years ago, she didn’t even recall the bloke’s face, let alone name — but suddenly, she saw a flash of red hair — 

“Oh shit,” she blurted out. She was suddenly very sure it was Ron Weasley’s jumper.

“I’m surprised you didn’t notice the giant R knitted in the front after all these years,” he smirked.

“I guess I — I’ve always kept it inside out,” she stammered, unsure how to apologize. Her ears burned. She wanted to die.

Ron roared with laughter. “Don’t apologize. I’ve — well, it was a pleasure, even if you don’t remember a second of it. And you’re still as pretty as I remember.”

“Shut up, you’re making it worse,” she mumbled. She was sure her face was the same color as his hair now. And yet still she could feel the corners of her mouth curl ever so rebelliously up.

The door jingled open. They both turned to see Harry coming in behind Draco. Draco was covered up modestly under Harry’s Auror robes. His face was flushed.

They walked up to Ron and Pansy’s booth. “He’s cleared,” Harry announced.

“Cool, cool,” Ron said, twisting to look up at the two. “The Aurors treat you alright, Malfoy?”

Malfoy huffed, turning to look away.

“No more plotting,” Harry said sternly, pointing a finger at Pansy and shaking.

Pansy rolled her eyes. “Alright, Dad.”

Ron laughed.

***

“So, you and Weasley, huh?” Draco smirked from her couch later that night. He was still nestled in Harry’s Auror robes.

“I’m not the one in Potter’s robes,” she snorted.

“Well it’s not like I’ve anything else to wear,” he complained, “I can’t believe I’ve been wearing Weasley’s _hookup jumper_ for the last twenty-four hours, honestly, just thinking about it makes me want to take another bath —”

“Oh shut up,” Pansy said. She took a long pull of merlot and then handed it to Draco, before pouring out another for herself. “He is rather fit though, don’t you think?”

Draco gagged into his glass. “Merlin, are you trying to kill me?”

“I’m not the one who has the hots for the Saviour,” Pansy teased, but as she took in the deep crimson of Potter’s robes, she wondered how much of it was actually true.

***

She found out exactly how true the next day, when she walked in on them making out on her couch, the robes still under Draco as Harry pressed him firmly into them.

***

“I just don’t understand who’d want to murder the both of them,” Draco said over takeout curry that night.

They were both firmly ignoring the “Potter Situation”.

“Hannah?” Pansy suggested.

Draco shook his head. “She’s a Hufflepuff, Pansy.”

“Yeah, well. What about Lady Greengrass?”

“She was in on it. She —” Draco bit his lip, before smirking a bit. “She liked to watch, sometimes.”

Pansy shuddered. “Alright. Astoria? Daphne?”

“I don’t know. Have you spoken with them?”

Pansy shook her head. “The funeral’s tomorrow though. We could see them there.”

“Nah. Even I’m not that gaudy.”

“Alright,” Pansy agreed. Blaise’s funeral had been yesterday. They’d already decided to visit the tombstone in a week’s time.

Draco slurped down a noodle.

“How’d you get your alibi anyway?” Pansy asked. She leaned over and wiped sauce off his cheek.

Draco blushed. “Well, Blaise wanted to record it. So, so I had a timestamped video of us - you know, fucking.”

“How convenient,” Pansy said sourly. And then her mind slowly caught up to her words. How - how convenient. Like Blaise had planned it all along, for Draco to have an alibi.

Draco seemed to be realizing the same. He bolted up. And then he collapsed back down on the sofa. “He couldn’t have—” But she was thinking the same. He could — Blaise could have murdered Lord Greengrass, and then he could have killed himself after. It was possible. Even though Pansy had no idea why Blaise would do such a thing. But lately she thought she didn’t know Blaise very well at all.

“Draco,” Pansy cooed, pulling him toward her, “Draco, is there a recording device in Lord Greengrass’s bedroom as well?”

“Yes,” he said. “The mirror. It’s a pensive mirror. He liked to record us fucking. Sometimes we’d watch ourselves while we were fucking.”

Pansy pictured old Lord Greengrass fucking while watching himself fuck while all the cherubs painted on the ceiling watched on with their eerily piercing yellow eyes. It was all so ridiculous that Pansy almost laughed. But then Draco nestled his face against her breasts and sobbed. 

***

Ron stopped by a week later. Draco was out doing — something, Pansy couldn’t keep track of what, she was a goddamn working woman, not a babysitter — so Pansy had been alone to greet him at the door.

“Nice specs,” Ron grinned.

Pansy self-consciously tugged at her glasses. She used them to write, nothing else. But he didn’t know that. He didn’t know anything about her, except what she looked like with or without her glasses.

“Anyway, just wanted to stop by and let you know that the case’s closed. Murder-suicide. The pensive mirror really cinched it. Thanks. We really appreciated your help. Even though I know, you know, it’s hard to lose a friend. You’ve been really - you know, put together, professional — through all of this —”

At this point Pansy realized he was rambling. And that she already knew everything that he’d been telling her. In fact, _everyone_ knew what he’d been telling her; she read it in the paper this morning. She also read about how Hannah was having an affair with Daphne, and how Astoria had eloped to New York with an American sailor. It was a heavy news day, a news day that she was very happy not to be involved in.

So really, he had no reason to be here. He could have sent an owl, if he really wanted to be gracious. But here he was, to see her in person. As though he wanted an excuse to see her.

“I’m working,” she blurted out.

“What?” he said, startled. He looked down at her black yoga pants and tank top as though she was lying.

“I really am,” she insisted. “I have a job. I’m a writer. I write novels. You haven’t heard of them because I sell them to Muggles. They - they do quite well. I make loads of money. And I keep on winning awards. I mean. I don’t mean to brag. I just - I just don’t want you to think that I just laze around all day doing nothing, because — because —”

“That’s impressive,” Ron said.

“Yeah, so,” she said, looking up at him. “So if you want to get to know me more, I’ve got loads more to — to get to know.”

He looked like he was trying not to laugh. “Sure I do,” he said, warm and generous. “Why don’t you give me one of your books now, and we can talk about it over drinks sometime?”

“Oh dear Merlin, please no,” she shuddered. But she went back and found a book for him anyway.

***

“I’m moving in with Potter,” Draco announced the next morning. He’d made coffee again, and scrambled eggs.

“Lovely,” Pansy said, yawning. She’d stayed up all last night writing. And then his words really sunk in, and she jerked awake.

He smirked.

“So you’re over old, wrinkled dicks?” she teased. She reached for the hot sauce. He leaned over and handed it to her, humming, pleased

“Can he even be your sugar daddy, at his age?” she pressed on.

“Dear Merlin, no,” he scoffed, “Have you seen how much they pay Aurors these days?”

They had all seen, of course, thanks to Granger’s latest bill on transparent government spending.

“You might even need to pick up a job. I’ve maybe an open editor position, if you beg enough.” She winked.

He laughed. “I’ll keep in touch.” He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. And then he picked up his bag and walked out her front door.


End file.
